“Pathetic batting” - Ravi Ashwin lashes out at Indian batters after 408-run drubbing vs South Africa

Former Indian spinner and analyst Ravi Ashwin has slammed the Indian Test team for their poor batting skills against the Temba Bavuma-led South Africa as the hosts suffered a 0-2 Test series defeat.

Interestingly, this was India’s second consecutive Test series whitewash at home after earlier losing to New Zealand by 0-3 last year. Speaking on his YouTube channel, Ashwin stated that the current Indian batting line-up doesn’t attempt the sweep shot against spinners.

“It was absolutely shell-shocked, pathetic batting. I have been saying this for the past 3-4 years that the players we have don’t attempt the sweep shot. When we lost in the New Zealand series, you would find that the New Zealand batters defended the ball by sweeping. Their defence wasn’t their defence. Rather, their sweep was their defence. If you give them two deliveries, they would defend once and try a sweep or a reverse sweep. And they practice and are very, very good at it,” Ashwin said on the Ash ki Baat show on his YouTube channel.

“As a spinner who is encountering this, you need runs on the scoreboard. If you have 250-260 runs on the board, these sweeps can be blocked and you can even take a wicket with a good ball. If you are getting all out for 140, 150, 160 and you are behind in the game, you have to run to catch up. And when I say pathetic batting, there is no ability to trust the defence. Tristan Stubbs got out defending badly. But he played 400 balls in this Test series. Even if he had a bad defence, he was ready to back that. He didn’t have the greatest of defence but we didn’t have the ability to get past his defence. Eventually ended up making 94 runs,” he added.

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